The Best Place to Take a Bath

Budapest, Hungary would put your best bathing experience to shame. Even better than a hot, bubbling jaccuzzi, surrounded by flaming scented candles and quiet music, are the Budapest bath-houses. This was not originally on our Europe itinerary, but after a recommendation from a friend, I googled it and decided we had to go there. It helped that Budapest was on the way from Krakow to Croatia, so no detour needed there.

Unfortunately, the weather was not the greatest when we were there, but we made the most of it. We spent most of our time soaking up the mineral waters of the bath houses. After hiking in the Alps, biking, hiking, and walking constantly in Austria, and walking for 3 days in Krakow, we were ready for a little relaxation and made the most of it in our time in Budapest. 

Over the course of 2 days in Budapest, we probably spent about 7 hours in two different bath-houses. When we got to Budapest, we walked 30 minutes to our hostel, but when we got there, the guy who was working the "front desk" said there had been a mistake with the bookings. I say "front desk" because this hostel was basically somebody's apartment where they just rented out the rooms. This is pretty common in Eastern Europe, but it was weird to get used to. On the plus side, it's cheap. He apologized that he had to upgrade our room to the private double bed with our own bathroom instead of the mixed 6-bed dorm we had booked. Cath and I had no problem with that. It was like the honeymoon suite of a low-cost Hungarian hostel. The beauty was that it only cost us 50 euro for both of us for 3 nights. So cheap!

As I said before, the weather was not fantastic, so we spent most of our bath time in the warm thermal baths to heat up. The first bathhouse we went to was the biggest one in Budapest. It had 3 larger pools outside, with old men playing chess and jets that spurted up sporadically. The were also a whole bunch of baths inside, ranging from 8-40 degree water. I tried going into the cold plunge 8 degree pool for after the saunas, but made it to my waist and chickened out. It was way too cold! The thermal mineral water was so relaxing, and you just feel so clean after it.

Cath and I under water

Catherine's digital camera is waterproof, so naturally we took it to the baths with us and got some candid underwater photos, like this beauty above....

Wave Pool at bath house #2

The second bathhouse we went to had a wave pool outside which was awesome, but it also had separate men's and women's sections inside. Catherine was excited to go in those, but I was a little more wary. I know what "women only" means - there's a good chance people will be naked in there! Europeans have no shame like North Americans do when it comes to stripping down in public. Thankfully, most people chose to keep their tops on in the female section. By the end of the whole trip in Europe, I definitely got more used to seeing people "bare all" in public - the beaches of Croatia will do that to you.

Capturing the sunset along the Danube

Budapest Parliament building

We took a free walking tour in Budapest as well, which ended with a large portion of the group going out for a cheap Hungarian lunch together. It was delicious, and only a couple bucks. I'm trying to remember the name of the restaurant (it was more of a cafeteria), I'm sure I'll think of it later, but for some cheap, authentic food, it is a great find. On our last night in Budapest we watched the sunset on the famous Danube river.

Great city!

Next it's off to our adventures in Croatia!!

Aushwitz and Birkenau: Emotions Running High

I have been putting off writing this post, and I think it's because it's still difficult for me to process everything I saw that day in Poland. I do not regret going, because it was a very meaningful experience, but it is hard to describe it all in words. This post will be mostly pictures instead, since a picture says 1000 words. Hopefully this gives you a taste of what I saw that day

It was cloudy and cool that day, which set the tone for a somber occasion. I'm not trying to put anyone off of visiting concentration camps in Europe, just be prepared if you go, to feel overwhelmed.

Entrance to Auschwitz

The wooden structure on the right is where the Nazi guard would stand for roll call each day. The photo is taken from where the prisoners would stand.

Sleeping quarters for prisoners. 6-8 people would sleep on each level.

The killing wall. This is where countless prisoners were shot. It is now a memorial to those who died.

The view from the shooting wall

The Auschwitz museum had collections of different items that were seized by the Nazis when prisoners entered the camps. This photo shows some of the many crutches and prosthetic limbs that were taken. This one hit me hard just trying to imagine the physically disabled losing their crutches and aids. It was basically just a death sentence to them all since they could not work.

Some of the shoes that were collected by the Nazis. These used items were of more value to the Nazis than the people who once owned them.

Birkenau toilets.

 The photo above shows the bathroom facility for the prisoners of Birkenau. Auschwitz was a work camp, but Birkenau was more where people came to die. Prisoners were given 30 seconds to use these washrooms only twice per day. A lot of prisoners were sick and would have the runs, but they could only use this twice in a day. It was heart-breaking to see this. Some of the prisoners' jobs were to clean out these washrooms, with their bare hands. They were only given a short amount of time to wash their hands in running water, no soap.

Living quarters at Birkenau

These bunks would each have 8-10 prisoners, each prisoner sleeping on  a plank of wood. Before the war this building was a horse stable. Just goes to show what the Nazis thought of the Jews.

In between these tracks is where the sorting would take place. One side of the camp was the death side, the other side was for the fit and was the work side, but both lead to eventual death.

Before the camps were liberated, the Nazis attempted to hide the evidence of gas chambers by blowing them up. This is the rubble of one of the 4 chambers found at Birkenau.

A part of the memorial set up at Birkenau in remembrance of  those who suffered and died in the camps.

At the end of an emotional day, Cath and I decided to debrief and bring in some light and enjoyment to close off our Poland leg. Seeing as we both love the piano and Chopin, we found a cheap concert that included wine and this guy playing piano for us in a small, intimate setting. He was fantastic, the wine was delicious, and we were able to get over what we had seen that day and move on to our next destination with renewed vigor. I think we will always carry a piece of this experience in Poland with us. It is one thing to read the stories in books, but to see for yourself where the mass-killings took place is a whole other experience.

Take-home message: We are blessed.

Krakow, Poland

Random but every time I hear Krakow, I always think of this cartoon...

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I'm not much of a history buff, I'm sure my past high school socials teachers can attest to that, but one area I was always interested in was World War II. Maybe it's because it hits closer to home. I remember hearing lots of stories from my parents and grandparents about the experiences my grandparents had in the war, and it always made me proud to be Canadian because if it weren't for the Canadians liberating Holland when they did, most of my family would have died and I probably would not have existed. This brings me to the next destination on my journey around Europe - Krakow, Poland.

Fountain in the Main Square

I have always wanted to see the Auschwitz concentration camp. It has always intrigued me, and I think it's a valuable part of world history to remember. Another reason I wanted to go to Poland was to complete the Europe music tour I went on in high school on my own terms, in the country of my favorite classical musician - Chopin. While planning the trip, we decided to eliminate Chopin's birthplace, Warsaw, because it is quite far out of the way and would have taken up a couple extra days that we just didn't have. So, we decided to stick with Krakow. We didn't know very much about the city itself, aside from the fact that Auschwitz is not far from it, so we went in without clear direction of what we wanted to do. We discovered a free walking tour of the city run mostly by local university students, which was a great way to see the city. A lot of major European cities have free tours like this. (Free as in by donation)

Main Market Square

We spent our first day exploring the city. We arrived early in the morning after an overnight train that was super cramped and a little cold, and very old, so we were a little tired, but after a nice shower and some breakfast we were ready to explore. The downside? After our free walking tour it started pouring outside. Being from Vancouver we are very used to rain. But this was rain like I had never seen before. Torrential downpour. Not to mention thunder and lightning. We ran for cover with the locals in whatever buildings we could.  There were even these guys dressed as beer steins, probably promoting a pub, who ran down the street looking for shelter. This might not be funny to anyone else, but having the visual remembered in my mind is actually making me laugh out loud.

The next day we decided to go take a tour to see Auschwitz and Birkenau Concentration camps. I was going to talk more about that in this post, but it's getting long, so I'll cover that in the next one.

Tower from the old medieval city wall 

On our last day in Krakow, we took another free walking tour of the old Jewish quarter. There are very few Jews still living in the city after WWII, but the old synagogue, school, and the Jewish ghetto are evidence of the large population that was there before. We went to Schindler's factory, from the movie Schindler's list. It has been turned into a museum about the whole city of Krakow during WWII and it's a super unique museum. I'm not usually a fan of museums, but this one was pretty sweet. Well done.

Our next stop was Budapest, Hungary, only a 6 hour train ride away. 

Hallstatt and Salzburg, Austria

A little background before getting into the heart of this post, we discovered through planning this trip that a lot of the places we were going to were UNESCO World Heritage sites, and Hallstatt is no exception. I wanted this trip to be similar to the Amazing Race in which we would take in as much as possible in the short time we had in each place in order to see as much as possible. While looking up where to go in Austria, I discovered a Rick Steeves video on you-tube where there was an ancient salt mine. The part that caught my attention however was the big slides in the salt mine that you can slide down. It felt like an Amazing Race opportunity, so that's partly why we decided to go there...and because it's beautiful.

Hallstatt, Austria

The town of Hallstatt is a couple hour bus ride outside of Salzburg, and since our hostel was cheaper in Salzburg than what we could get in Hallstatt, we decided to visit it as a day trip from Salzburg, so it became a pretty packed day. We had to take 2 buses to get there, but we figured it out and made it to the town shortly before lunch. We wandered the streets a little to get a feel of the place and to find the information center where we could figure out how to get to the salt mine. 

The salt mine is in the mountain above Hallstatt. There is a funicular that can take you up, or there is a short-ish hike (I think about 2 hours or less) and that option is free. Naturally, we decided to get some exercise and save some cash by walking. The trouble is, we did not have much time since we had to make sure we didn't miss the last bus, and the trails were not well marked. Story of our lives, we got "lost". in quotations because we still knew where we were and how to get back, but we could not figure out which path led up the mountain. There were a lot of narrow paths and staircases, but most of them terminated at people's houses. Eventually, we gave in and walked over to the funicular to take it up the mountain. From the funicular it is about a 10 minute hike to the salt mine. 

At the salt mine, we had to put on these suits to cover our clothing before going in. Super attractive. Then the tour guide took us deep into the mountain and we learned about salt mining and its origins in Austria 2000 years ago. Crazy. Anyways, the highlight was in order to go deeper into the mountain mine, we got to take slides. It was sweet. The picture below is not super quality, but it can give a bit of a visual of what went down.

There was also a staircase for the faint of heart. This was a very unique stop on the trip and I would definitely recommend it if you're looking for something different to do. We were some of the only North Americans on the trip. It seems to be the kind of place Europeans go to on holidays. 

We spent our last day in Salzburg wandering the streets, saw the outside of Mozart's house (neither of us cared about going in), and we enjoyed the panorama views from the fortress Hohensalzburg. 

Beautiful city, beautiful weather, but many more fun times to come. Good solid start to the trip.

Fortress Hohensalzburg

The Hills Are Alive

Our next stop in the journey was in the beautiful city of Salzburg, Austria. I'll talk more about the city in another post because I want to dedicate this one to our Sound of Music adventure.

When I went to Europe the first time on the FVC music tour, I loved Salzburg, but felt robbed of one essential part of the city - the Sound of Music Tour. I remember begging Mr. Myung if we could use our free time to go on the tour. He said no, and it was at that point I decided I wanted to your Europe on my own terms. Being on a school trip at the time, I couldn't just abandon the group without severe consequences, so I pledged to myself to return one day and do the tour.

Fast forward 6 years and I am back in Salzburg Austria, but on a budget. I wanted to travel Europe as cheaply as possible, partly because I didn't have a lot of money to work with, but also because the Dutch side of me craves good deals. My sister and I noticed the different tours offered cost anywhere from 30-60 Euros, which translates to around $45-90. I decided that was too expensive, so we researched instead where the tours went, located those places to the best of our ability on our map of Salzburg and decided to rent bicycles for a few hours for under 10 Euro and show ourselves around. We both know the Sound of Music well enough to recognize the sites when we see them.

It was a super hot day, we only had a few hours, and the places were pretty far apart, so we didn't waste any time getting going. We started at Mirabell Gardens, where Maria takes the kids when they go out on the town and they sing and run through the garden, so we did precisely that.

Next, we set out to find Nonburg Abbey, which is used as Maria's abbey for parts of the film. Since it's up on the hill by the Salzburg Fortress, I figured we'd have to pay to get there because you have to pay for the fortress. Turns out you don't, but we didn't know that at the time, so we returned later when we went to see the fortress. We then biked out several kilometers to see the back view of the Von Trapp house. I was leading with the map, and the signs and directions were very misleading. It was super hot out, so we're sweating and thirsty, and we get lost. We did manage to locate it after a little arguing and discussing how if we were in the Amazing Race, this would be the leg we would lose on.  (Side note, I have always wanted to be on the Amazing Race, and my sister would want to as well, so we pretended a lot on this trip that we were on the show. It worked because the trip was pretty fast-paced, so you had to be ready each day to do as much as possible.)

Back view of Von Trapp house in the Sound of Music

After this, we biked to Helbrunn Palace where the infamous gazebo from the movie is now found. We got lost again, but the way there we were planning how we were going to dance around it and sing. When we got there, out dreams were shot down because the gazebo is locked. You can't go inside. So we just had to take pictures outside instead.

At this point, we were exhausted and our rental was almost up, so we biked back to the city to return our bikes. This was definitely the cheapest way to go see the sights. We got back to our hostel (JUFA Salzburg - good place to stay - clean, large rooms and bathrooms, $28 a night, and good continental breakfast), took cold showers, than walked around the city before heading out to watch the last Harry Potter (in English) at the local theatre.

Definitely a good way to spend a sunny day in Salzburg.